Top 11 Ultimate Cold Calling Guidelines To Boost Your Sales
What is cold calling guidelines?
Cold calling guidelines is a form of telemarketing in which a salesperson attempts to solicit business from potential customers who have not previously expressed interest in the seller’s product or solution.
For outbound sales teams, cold calling guidelines is often the first—and arguably the most important—step towards creating sales opportunities. The goal is to make the first contact with a person or company that fits your ideal customer profile, briefly introduce your product or solution, and determine if there’s enough interest to move forward.
Also read: 25 Cold Calling Tips You Can Use To Get Meetings with Anyone
Here are the top 11 ultimate cold calling guidelines to boost your sales:
1) Focus on the goal.
Beginners tend to think that cold calling guidelines is about making the sale. It’s not. It’s about getting the chance to make the sale. Specifically, the purpose of a cold call is to set an appointment to make the pitch.
2) Research your markets and prospects before cold calling.
You need to target your cold calling to the right audience. Use market research to focus on your target market. Then find out as much as you possibly can about the company or individual you’re going to call in advance. This gives you the huge advantage of being able to talk about their business and their needs when you call them.
According to the Gartner Group, in a typical business with 100-500 employees an average of seven people are responsible for most buying decisions, so connecting with the right people is critical to your cold calling success.
3) Improve your chances to connect by leveraging social media contacts.
According to statistics from Vorsight, if the person you are calling is in a common LinkedIn group you are 70% more likely to get to speak with them on a cold call. And what’s true of LinkedIn is true of other social media platforms; having a connection through a social media group will increase the prospect’s receptiveness when you reach out to contact them (one more reason to work on establishing/extending your social media presence).
4) Prepare an opening statement for your call.
This lets you organize your thoughts before calling, and helps you avoid common mistakes in the opening that would give the person you’re calling the chance to terminate the conversation. For instance, when you’re cold calling, you should never ask, “Is this a good time to talk?” or “How are you today?” Don’t read your opening statement into the phone, but use it as a framework to get the conversation off to a good start.
5) What should be in the cold call’s opening statement?
“Include a greeting and an introduction, a reference point (something about the prospect), the benefits of your product or service, and a transition to a question or dialogue.”
AllBusiness.com
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Here’s an example of a cold call opening:
“Good afternoon, Ms. Marshall. This is Kendra Brown with Green Works. I read in the local paper that you recently broke ground for a new office complex. We specialize in commercial landscape services that allow you to reduce in-house maintenance costs and comply with the city’s new environmental regulations. I’d like to ask a few questions to determine whether one of our programs might meet your needs.'”
6) Prepare a script for the rest of your cold call.
Lay out the benefits of your product or service and the reasons your prospect should buy. Write out possible objections and your answer to them. Without a cold calling script, it’s too easy to leave something out or meander. Once again, it’s not that you’ll be reading your script word for word when you call, but that you’ve prepared the framework of the cold call in advance.
Be prepared to answer detailed questions about your products and services! According to Forbes Insight, 58% of potential buyers report that sales reps are unable to answer their questions effectively.
7) Ask for an appointment at a specific time during your cold call.
Say, “Would Wednesday at 11 a.m. be a good time to meet?” instead of saying, “Can I meet with you to discuss this next week?” You want to get your prospect to commit to a meeting during this first call, rather than leaving it vague and necessitating a second call to set up a meeting – which may never happen if you can’t get through to the prospect again.
8) Remember that gatekeepers are your allies, not your foes.
Be pleasant to whoever picks up the phone or is guarding the inner sanctum when cold calling. Develop strategies to get the gatekeeper on your side. Sometimes asking, “I wonder if you could help me?” will help you get the information you need, such as the name of the right person to talk to or when the best time to contact the prospect is. Learning the names of gatekeepers and being friendly when cold calling guidelines helps too.
9) Smooth the way for your call by sending prospects a small, unique promotional item.
This helps break the ice and makes your business stand out from the crowd. Pat Cavanaugh, sales guru of Inc.com), says, “It’s amazing. A $2.15 crazy little item we’ve sent out has helped us get Fortune 500 accounts. When we call, they say, “Oh yeah….you were the one that sent me that…” It may seem cheesy or unnecessary, but it works.
10) Do your cold calling early in the morning or late in the afternoon, if possible.
These are the best times to reach the decision-maker directly. Statistically, Thursday is the best day to cold call, Wednesday is the second-best, and Tuesday is the worst (InsideSales.com).
11) Be persistent.
“80% of new sales are made after the fifth contact, yet the majority of salespeople give up after the second call”. Don’t be one of those who gives up so easily. If you want to make the sale, you need to try and try again.
Above all, practice, practice, practice. While cold calling guidelines may never be much fun for you, you can get better at it, and the more you practice, the more effective a sales technique it will be. So get your script and your call list together and reach for the phone. The people who want to do business with you are out there – but you have to let them know about you first.
Also read: 8 Easy Rules for Cold-Calling Customers
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